The History of the Philadelphia Jewish Federation
by Kathryn Levy Feldman
As Jacob Gimbel, one of Philadelphia’s leading
merchants, walked briskly to Mercantile Hall on Broad Street, south
of Jefferson on the morning of Sunday, February 10, 1901, he could
see his breath. In spite of the frigid 18 degree temperature, the day
was clear and bright and he was glad he had decided to walk to the
meeting of the city’s Jewish leaders at which the issue of forming
a Federation of Jewish Charities would be discussed. Even though he
was not closely involved with any of the city’s Hebrew charities,
he felt the issue was important enough for him to attend. As Gimbel
maneuvered carefully around ice patches, dodging frisky trotters
pulling sporting sleighs through the snow covered streets, he noted
with satisfaction that progress was slowly being made on the widening
of Chestnut Street. He glanced at the marquee outside the Broad
Street Theater advertising its current offering, William Gillette in
"Sherlock Holmes", and quickened his pace. When he arrived
at Mercantile Hall, he was pleased to find that about 500 of his
fellow Israelites had also considered the discussion important enough
to brave the elements. They, like Gimbel, were well aware of the
burden that the recent influx of Jewish immigrants had placed on the
city’s charitable organizations and they were willing to consider
any proposal that might make it easier for organizations like the
Jewish Hospital, United Hebrew Charities, Jewish Foster Homes, Hebrew
Education Society, Orphans’ Guardians, Jewish Maternity
Association, Jewish Immigrant Society and the Young Women’s Union
and Hebrew Society to do their jobs. Little did Gimbel realize that
within days he would be president of the first Federation of Jewish
Charities of Philadelphia.
Although the spirit of nonpartisanship in which the
Federation was founded was considered very modern, the concepts of tzedakah and gemilut hasadim, on which the organization based its principles
were as old as the Torah. Throughout history, Jews have always cared
for their own. It has always been considered a mitzvah of the highest
priority for fortunate Jews to care for those less fortunate and those
who settled in Philadelphia adhered to these traditions. From the earliest
burial societies formed under the auspices of the first synagogues,
to tzedakah funds and later
mutual aid societies, Jews in Philadelphia responded with generosity
and often anonymity to the needs of their brethren. By 1813, the members
of Mikveh Israel, Philadelphia’s oldest Sephardic synagogue (established 1740) had
instituted the first extra-synogogal Jewish organization in Philadelphia,
the Hebra Shel Bikur Holim Ugemilut Hasadim or Society for the
Visitation of the Sick and Mutual Assistance and by 1819, two female
congregants of Mikveh Israel had formed The Female Hebrew Benevolent
Society. In 1822, members of congregation Rodeph Shalom established
the United Hebrew Beneficent Society, followed in short order by the
creation of the the Jewish Foster Home in 1855, the Jewish Hospital
in 1864, and the Young Men’s Hebrew Association in 1875.
It is interesting to note that during the time
that the earliest Jewish charitable agencies were created in
Philadelphia, there were relatively few Jews in need of their
services. Edwin Wolf 2nd and Maxwell Whiteman, in their classic 1956
tome, The History of the Jews of Philadelphia from Colonial Times
to the Age of Jackson, write, "There did not exist, and did
not appear for many years, a body of Jewish poor. They were not as a
group habitual drunkards, confirmed beggars or malingerers;
apparently no Jews applied for admittance to the city
poorhouse." By the late 1800’s, however, the situation would
be very different. Violent anti-Semitic pogroms in Russia and Eastern Europe, combined with glowing tales of
American streets paved with gold and general European unrest, spurred
thousands of European Jews to emigrate to the "new"
country.
In 1880, approximately 15,000 Jews lived in
Philadelphia. By March of 1890, Moses Dropsie noted in his report to
the annual meeting of the Hebrew Education Society that there were
between 26,000 and 28,000 Jews in Philadelphia, about 10,000 of whom
were born in Slavic and Hungarian countries. It is estimated that
60,000 Jewish immigrants landed at the port of Philadelphia between
1882 and 1904, nearly quadrupling the cities’ Jewish population and
dramatically altering its ethnic mix, in twelve years.The immigration
pattern in Philadelphia was a microcosm of that in the United States.
By 1904, Jewish immigration hit 75,000 and by 1918, it was 200,000.
In fifty years, the Jewish population in the United States increased
twenty times while the total population more than tripled.
The Eastern European Jews who arrived at the
city’s port, at the foot of Washington Avenue in South Philadelphia
were, for the most part, poor and unskilled. They settled in the
alleys and courtyards of Fourth and Fifth Streets south of Pine in
what would become the equivalent of New York’s Lower East Side.
They became peddlers, rag men, cigar makers, even "horse radish
men" calling out their wares in Yiddish, a dialect that was as
foreign to the city’s older more established German Jewish
population as it was to their gentile neighbors. Nonetheless, the
German elite population felt an obligation to care for their
"poorer cousins" even though, as Dropsie notes, "yet
but very few of them are able to contribute in relieving the
necessities and caring for the well being of their countrymen."
As Dropsies’ remarks suggest, a large and sustained rift would
develop between the two factions of Philadelphia Jews that would
continue well into the early years of the Federation.
One of the reasons for this tension was the demand
that the large influx of Russian Jews placed on the city’s
previously largely symbolic Jewish charities. From the moment a
Jewish immigrant arrived on the dock in Philadelphia, his every need
was met by some charitable organization. An agent of the Association
of Jewish Immigrants directed him; the Sheltering Home offered him a
place to stay for a few days; the employment bureau of the Hebrew
Charities helped him find a job. Whenever he required their services,
the hospital, orphan asylum and burial society were all at his
disposal. It is little wonder that there were was never enough money
to go around. Up until the immigration act of 1924 curbed the mass
influx of European Jews, the fledgling Federation found itself in the
position of supporting the economic and welfare needs of an
impoverished population that was not able, or willing to repay its
debts.
Russian Jews, for the most part, founded and
supported their own charitable organizations. They established their
own Orthodox synagogues, burial
societies, schools and newspapers (in Hebrew and Yiddish) to provide
newcomers with information about their community as well as their
relatives all over the world. Department store owner Samuel Lit is
said to have solicited a well-to do Russian Jew for the
Federation-sponsored building of Eagleville Sanitarium for
consumptives, by suggesting that since he had prospered, he should
contribute to the effort. "You’re right.," was the reply.
"so I’ll tell you — You German Jews contribute the money,
and we Russian Jews will contribute the tuberculosis."
By 1918, the Federation’s income totaled
$289,819 but annual deficits, met by borrowing from endowment funds,
had piled up to more than $100,000. World War I had brought inflation
and the problem of meeting ongoing needs with less valuable dollars
became critical. In the Spring of 1919, the Board of Directors of the
Federation decided to regroup and reorganize. They voted to expand
their original constituency from 14 to 39 agencies and amend their
by-laws to permit directors and officers of constituents to serve on
their board, which they enlarged from 12 members to 40. But by far
the most significant change they enacted was to include Russian Jews
in leadership positions previously occupied by Jews of German
descent. By including Russian Jews among their elite, Federation sent
a message to their constituency. The time had come to accept and
recognize Russian Jews, and their charities, as part of the
Philadelphia Jewish community. In 1919, the Federation’s new
agencies included some that were founded by Russian Jews, notably the
Talmud Torah Association, Mount Sinai Hospital, the Hebrew Sheltering
Home and Old Age Home. The board also included representatives from
these constituencies including Jacob Gutman, one of the few
Russian-born Jews to penetrate into high FJC circles.
The recognition of Russian Jews by the leaders of
the Philadelphia Federation mirrored a major change in American Jewry
in the early 20th century. Up until the 1920’s, most Jews in the
United States were immigrants or children of immigrants. With the
passage of the immigration act of 1924, the focus of the Federation,
and rightfully its leadership, shifted from Europe and the "old
country" to America and the creation of a "new"
country — Israel. American Jewry had matured and so, for the first
time, had its leaders in America. This new generation recognized
Federation as a business and, as such, hired its first full time
administrator, Jacob Billikopf, who according to Gutman (as quoted in
Murray Friedman’s book, Jewish Life in Philadelphia, 1830-1940),
was "a brilliant man who knew how to unite communities around
federated organizations...He also had a strong Lithuanian
accent."
The mid-twenties were the years of the great boom
and the newly reorganized Federation benefited from the economy.
During this time, Federation’s annual campaigns reached $1,500,000
and more. Without needs for Israel and overseas Jewish relief,
practically all the funds were directed toward local endeavors and
the construction of new buildings. During the presidency of Justin P.
Allman, Federation put up new buildings at Jewish and Mt. Sinai
Hospitals, Eagleville Sanitorium, Willow Crest Convalescent Home, two
schoolhouses for the Associated Talmud Torahs and a new home for its
own operation at Ninth and Pine Streets.
The big boom, of course, was followed in short
order by the big bust. In 1930 when Lessing J. Rosenwald became
president, the Federation was running a $320,000 deficit. Campaign
funds evaporated as bread lines lengthened and "Hoovervilles"
began sprouting up, even in Philadelphia. In 1931, the leaders of the
city’s business, labor, government and philanthropic sectors
convened to discuss how to best handle the growing crisis. The
meetings included representatives from the Welfare Federation of
Protestant and nonsectarian agencies and the Federation of Jewish
Charities. After much discussion, they decided to form a joint
committee, under the leadership of Horatio Gates Lloyd, for the
purpose of conducting a joint campaign for unemployment relief. The
United Campaign on behalf of the Welfare Federation and Federation of
Jewish Charities (as it was called) set a goal of $9,000,000. It
raised $10,000,000. The two "Federations" joined forces
again in 1932 and, after separating briefly the following year,
formed the permanent partnership which we know today as United Way.
This joint partnership set an example for the rest
of the country. While there were fund-raising arrangements of varying
degrees between Jewish federations and welfare organizations in other
cities, none was as strong and far-reaching as the partnership in
Philadelphia. Well after the depression, the two organizations
continued to benefit from the knowledge and support of their vast and
diverse membership, which reached into practically all sectors of the
community. In retrospect, the creation of a united campaign could not
have come at a better time. As events in Germany unfolded and the
American Jewish community faced a crisis unlike any other in its
history, the previous existence of a united campaign effort in
Philadelphia enabled the city’s Jewish leaders to raise funds for
both domestic as well as overseas relief.
In 1937, Leo Heimerdinger, who was then president
of the Federation, and Kurt Peisser, the newly appointed executive
director, proposed the creation of "a double barreled
Federation," one barrel of which was to discharge local health
and welfare responsibilities, while the other would be aimed at the
growing overseas rescue needs. The domestic effort would be supported
by the Community Chest (now known as United Way). The overseas
effort, which they named the Allied Jewish Appeal, would be funded
separately. In 1938, Morris Wolf, in his capacity as president,
conducted the first AJA campaign in Philadelphia.
From the very start, Federation and Allied were
complimentary agencies. Between them, they covered the full range of
the community’s humanitarian responsibilities and they were once
described by Leon C. Sunstein, Sr., president of Allied from 1939-45
as "two faces of a single coin." Morris Wolf, the first
president of Allied, later became president of the Federation of
Jewish Charities. During the twenty years that the two agencies
existed side by side, the Philadelphia Jewish community not only
reaped the rewards of a more focused Federation effort with the
creation of such institutions as Albert Einstein Medical Center,
(created from a merger of Jewish Hospital, Mt. Sinai and Northern
Liberties) Moss Rehabilitation Hospital (originally a division of
Jewish Hospital that cared for the chronically ill, which became a
separate rehabilitative hospital in 1952), numerous neighborhood
recreation centers in the Northeast, and a revitalized Gratz College,
it gained a tremendous infusion of new blood into its volunteer pool,
courtesy of the nearly year round activity of the Allied Jewish
Appeal, which continued after the war, under AJA presidents, Sam
Daroff, Bernard G. Segal and Sol Satinsky.
With the founding
of the State of Israel in 1948, the social and philosophical
barriers that had once separated German Jews from those of Eastern
European lineage and, later, Zionists from non-Zionists, had all but disappeared. The time had come for
Jews in the United States to show unified support for the new Jewish
state. In 1956, the Federation and Allied Jewish Appeal were
consolidated into one central agency, the current Federation of
Jewish Agencies of Greater Philadelphia.
Each year, the Federation, through its FAJA
campaign, raises millions of dollars to help maintain Israel’s education, health and social service programs, support humanitarian
services in many other countries and serve the Greater Philadelphia
community. Its 26 constituent agencies and 4 affiliated programs,
which serve Jews as well as non-Jews, encompass social services,
education, health, culture and recreation. The Federation maintains
the mutually beneficial partnership with United Way of Southeastern
Pennsylvania (which had its roots in the 1930’s) and at present, is
the single largest recipient of United Way Funds, receiving close to
$3 million annually. These funds are distributed to social service
and health care agencies that are open to everyone in the Greater
Philadelphia area.
Over the years, Federation has launched special
campaigns in response to unique and urgent needs. These include those
stemming from the 1967 and 1973 wars, Project Renewal, which sought to improve conditions in several
disadvantaged Israeli neighborhoods and Operation
Moses, a vehicle through which the Philadelphia community could
participate in the resettlement of almost the entire population of Ethiopian
Jews in Israel. Several Philadelphians played key roles in
helping more than 700,000 Jews from the former Soviet Union resettle
in Israel and locally. More recently, through Partnership 2000, a
program that matches Jewish communities in the United States with
communities in Israel, the Federation has formed a partnership with
the community of Netivot/Azatta that promises to provide Philadelphia
volunteers with exciting opportunities for joint educational
programs.
Sources: American Jewish Historical Society |